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Thornwatch: the Forsaken
Rosie the Riveter "H-He didn't come-" Rosie's arms dropped to her sides at the realisation. She had waited for weeks. She'd even tied a Bent Bow wagon-wise twice, but the officers who answered the call didn't survive the deathtrap her followers had rigged. One of them approached her. "Ma'am, the halls are silent and the food has spoiled. Perhaps we should move on and continue the vigil elsewhere-" Rosie slammed her hulking metal fist against the wall beside her as her slender human hand clutched her stringy grey hair. Her cultist stared, transfixed on the befuddled look on Rosie's face. Rosie didn't move. "I... I killed them. Every single Dragonslayer in this tower, I killed them. I took time in their agony as I carefully broke the tendons in their legs with surgical precision. As they screamed, I picked them up like little ragdolls and bolted them to the walls wherever I found them. I did this because they were weak." The pale blue torches lining the narrow corridor flickered, momentarily obscuring the corpses mounted on the walls between them. Rosie's words did not falter. "They were pathetic, the fabled torturers hiding behind their mask of morality. Their crosses seared my flesh but I could see the fear in their eyes! Rosie the monster, the killer! The lofty Knights of the Dragonslayer were quaking in their boots from their own incompetence! But not now. Now they are strong, immortalized as figures of what the world should be. I escaped the madness of the Beyond to find a world full of people too weak to survive their own trivial lives, but I can fix it. I can put the world back together. I can make the weak strong again. That is why we are here, but we are here for so much more. You see, we are not alone. We are not the only strong ones, and when you expunge weakness from this caloused planet, the strong take their rightful place. He is strong. So why isn't He here?" Rosie slowly drifted, almost drunkenly, down the hallway, her arms hanging limply at her hips. She sighed, her eyes blankly looking out the balcony at the Hedge below. Some briarwolves looked back up at her before skittering away into the Thorns. "That is how this works. That is how this ALWAYS works! I perform my dark work and there He is, the strength of what good is left in this world, to stop me, to show me I've gone far enough this time. He never understood. He never understood that what I do is necessary and His part in it is just as crucial. The weak are to be punished, but so are the wicked. I cannot help our parts in this any more than He can, and yet He isn't here! Where is He? Where's Liberty? Justice? Where is the fairy on His shoulder or the army of men at His back? It's not like He didn't know where I was, He put me in here! I played my part perfectly and yet the stage is empty! My wicked heart burns to stay the course, to go on without Him and keep my vigil alight, but without His Torch to keep me on the twisting, turning path before me I stand here in the darkness, Lost." Rosie stood there, the chill breeze coming in from the open balcony door. Her follower gave in before she did, retiring to the ground floor to make sure their traps were still well-greased and properly set. An hour or so past, but Rosie did not budge. The call of a vileshriek off in the distance startled her, and suddenly her eyes grew wide with soul-crushing revelations. "But that means He is alone too! He's out there, just as Lost as I am or worse! He would have come were He able, I know as sure as fact! He would be here, so something keeps Him away, something stopping the cycle the two of us are riveted to from turning forever more. He needs me, as I need Him." As the cold-filled night washed over the Tower of Saint George that evening, Rosie the Riveter was gone, leaving only the chilling reminders of her presence rotting behind her. He had forsaken her, but she would not forsake him. Rosie Wright "My God, what have I done?" The young woman's assailant had stopped moving, his body, now lifeless, hung as dead weight on the tree behind him, a rivet, still hot to the touch, protruding out of his chest. Rosie stared at the blood coating the metal rivet gun attached to her where her right hand should have been. Maria, her only remaining Ally, choked on her own blood, the deep gash across her throat ensuring Rosie would be the only survivor of the highwayman's attack. Rosie looked over at Maria, both speechless, until Rosie saw what Maria had wrapped around her wrist during the assault. "A Bent Bow? You, you called Thornwatch to help us... We made it all this way from beyond Arcadia's gates, and we were still too weak to protect ourselves!" Rosie's tears feel silently into the pool of blood around her motley-mate Mamasha. "No. YOU were too weak. I survived! I'm going to be fine. YOU were the weak ones." "You're wrong." A hooded man she had not seen arrive spoke from the path in front of her, his copper skin reflecting both the light from above and the glint of steel from her arm. "If anyone here was weak, it was the monster who attacked you." The man clad in the uniform of Thornwatch knelt down to check if Brittany, the fourth member of Rosie's Allies, still had a pulse. She didn't. "The wicked, the evil in this world, are the truest form of weakness:the frailty in the hearts of men which makes them capable of things like this. If only I could have gotten here sooner." Rosie stared at the man, observing the Sorrow and Wrath he held in his eyes. She heard leaves rustle off in the distance behind her but she dismissed it. It was over now. It had to be over. The man's head whipped up as he looked straight past her. Rushing to her side, he looked her straight in the eyes. "Can you walk? It looks like your attacker had friends and we need to get you somewhere they won't find you." "You mean run? I don't want to run! These men, these weaklings are partially responsible for what happened to my friends!" Fire raged in Rosie's eyes. The officer saw it and understood. "Ma'am, I have no intention of running but I'd rather do my job knowing you are safe!" When Rosie didn't move, instead turning to face the men now charging up the road at the sight of their partner bloodied on the bark, the officer drew the wooden staff lashed to his back. As the blue scarf around his neck blew in the wind, the man charged forward, the force of his approach pulling the hood off his head. Slamming the wooden hook at the end of the staff against the ground, a rushing wave of fire poured out of it, engulfing the two men in flame for merely a moment. Taking advantage of their surprise, the man held out a single hand, calling the nearby Thorns to lash their vines around one of the criminals, holding him to the ground he now laid on. He was in pain, but he would survive long enough to face the price of his sins. When the second marauder tried to attack the officer during his diverted attention, Rosie slammed her oversized iron fist into the man's face, shattering his jaw. In a single motion Rosie used her other hand to push her marque into the Thorns and rivet him there. Screaming, she leapt onto the prone villain, still tied flush to the ground, and put a bolt right through him. Rosie collapsed to her knees beside him, tears streaming down her face. The officer, his face stricken with shock, stood over her, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Let's get you out of here, ma'am." "The name is Rosie. Rosie the Riveter." Rosie brought herself to look at him, he who had the strength to smite the wicked without becoming wicked himself. "I'm Liberty." Without another word he gave her his hand, helping her up as he grasped her rivet gun like she wanted it to be held, like it was normal. With now only Sorrow he gave her a half-smile, and she knew his strength as he knew hers. Category:Fiction